


Synced

by Arnica



Series: Torchwood a/b/o [4]
Category: Torchwood
Genre: Alpha/Beta/Omega Dynamics, F/M, Knotting, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-06-15
Updated: 2013-06-15
Packaged: 2017-12-15 02:10:31
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,613
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/844090
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Arnica/pseuds/Arnica
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>He’s been doing this since he was fifteen years old. You think he’d recognize the signs after eight years.</p>
<p>Part four of an alpha/beta/omega mini-verse done for Kink_bingo round 5 at Dreamwidth!</p>
            </blockquote>





	Synced

 

When Ianto wakes up light headed with a fever, the only thing he bothers thinking is how unfortunate his timing is and how it had better not be anything serious because he can’t leave Lisa alone in the Hub while he vomits and watches daytime telly at home in his pajamas. He hates all of his work clothes, can’t stand the idea of being buttoned head to toe in one of the heavy layered suits when he feels awful and kind of stupid, so he digs a pair of loose black yoga trousers from the back of his dresser with the other workout clothes and puts on half the shirts he owns, looking for something short sleeved, cool against his body, and not skin tight like the pale green tee he keeps pulling back over his head because the weird bamboo fabric feels good. He gives in half an hour after he should have left, yanking the shirt back on and sliding into his trainers on his way out the door at a run. 

 

Owen is trying to call, probably to bitch about the coffee not being ready the way he did the last time Ianto was more than thirty seconds later arriving than him, so he doesn’t bother picking it up, too busy ignoring the catcalls from alphas on the corners as he dashes through the streets. The breeze feels good on his flushed face and Ianto’s glad he’s the late one today because like a scatter brain he forgot his fucking keys at the flat. He slips in, locking the door behind himself and ducking through the false wall in the back, ignoring the madly buzzing phone in his pocket as the elevator descends. There is nothing Owen has to say to him so desperately that it can’t wait ten seconds, because if it was, someone else would have called from the official Torchwood line.

 

The door slides open and Owen is waiting right there on the other side and doesn’t look surprised to see him there. Annoyed, but not particularly surprised. Or impressed.

 

“You should have picked up your phone and saved yourself a jog across town. Turn around and go home, you can’t be in today.”

 

“It’s just a fever, I’m fine. How’d you know I was sick?” The doctor pauses in his attempt to swing Ianto around by his elbow, browns furrowed and expressive mouth tipped down into a curious frown.

 

“I didn’t.” He reaches up, sliding his hands around to the back of Ianto’s neck, fingertips palpating the flushed, swollen flesh at the nape of his neck. “You’re not sick you idiot. You’re in the preparatory stages of heat. You’ve been doing this, how long? A fucking decade now and you don’t have your damn cycle memorized yet? You‘re, I don‘t know, less than an hour out I‘d say.” He’s frozen in Owen’s grip, instinctively immobile as the medic’s fingers dig into the soft skin there.

 

“Seven and a half years and no. I’m not exactly regular and I can‘t be in heat. I haven‘t had one for months. Not since the tower…can we have this conversation somewhere more private?”

 

“No. Get back in the elevator now and Tosh will be up in a minute to drive you home. Stay there. Do yourself a knot-dial and don’t come back for the next three days.” Ianto steps back, doesn’t like the way Owen’s fingers under the edge of his hair are making his breath come short and his skin tingle, and tries to come up with a good reason why he can’t take his medical leave.

 

“I won’t. I’ve got _things_ to do. Time sensitive…things in the archives that I am capable of doing while I‘m…”

 

“Harkness is in rut you stubborn little shit. It’s already been a full morning’s work to keep him in the Hub instead of trying to track you down by scent and I may need to put him in the fucking cells now that you’ve come in and slut-stunk the place up to keep him from being a fucking menace to himself and others.” Vaguely Ianto hears the medic insulting him under the thick layer of genuine worry in his voice, but mostly he’s stuck on the beginning of the rant, brain playing the words ‘Jack’s in rut’ over and over again. “Hey! Teaboy, are you even listening…” Overhead the door to Jack’s office cracks open, Suzie Costello’s face peering out and crumpling in frustration even as she whips her head unerringly to where Owen has his hands over his face in disgust. “Well, that’s sorted. You’re on your own now because buggered if I‘m going to stand between you and two alphas. Good luck with that.” Suzie steps out of the office slowly and Ianto can hear the low bass rumble of Jack’s snarl. The woman slides sideways with her hands in plain sight, clearing the walkway without moving forward, even if she’s still staring at Ianto with a mixture of annoyance and predatory anticipation. Ianto lets his own annoyance flow through him like a cleansing cool wind of rationality that London was right; the last thing Three should have been allowed was omega workers, and then Jack is looming in the doorway and there’s no more rational thinking for Ianto. The big alpha is kind of perfect looking, bright red suspenders cutting across a fitted white tee that’s clinging to every inch of him, hair flopped half in those laser blue eyes as he grips the metal door frame to his office hard enough that Ianto can see the tension all the way up through to his shoulders.

 

“Go home. Now!” He should go home. He should _absolutely_ move as slowly and calmly as possible, backing towards the elevator, closing the gate between them, and running home as fast as he can once he hits street level. That is exactly what Ianto should do right now instead of walking forward, trying to judge the distance between the stairs to the lower levels and where he’s standing now, and he really shouldn’t be pausing at the base of the rift manipulator, looking coyly up through his lashes and thinking about how much better the chase will be when he‘s actually running to escape someone who can run him to ground; not just playing hard enough with someone who could never really catch him to get his heart rate spiked enough to kick off the second stage of heat.

 

“Can’t catch me, Sir.” Vaguely he can hear Owen cursing inventively as Ianto dashes off as fast as he can towards the service corridors, but mostly he just hears the slap of Jack’s feet echoing behind him in the narrow branching halls. 

 

The Hub is the perfect place to do this. It’s a warren of tunnels and secret passages and Ianto has mapped most of them in the nine weeks he’s been here, cutting through shortcuts and stairwells, weaving in and out of two warehouse sized floors of archives. Ianto keeps letting Jack get close enough to snatch at the edge of his clothes before spinning away or ducking underneath tables, sliding behind doors and through gaps in the shelving that wouldn’t have been big enough for him a year ago. It’s not until Ianto flings himself through an open door in a dusty far corner of the lowest level in the archives and comes up short, staring at a small room taken up mostly by an old brass bed stripped down to a ticked mattress gone yellow with age, an overhead light and nothing else, not even another door that he realizes he‘s been herded. Ianto whirls on his heel only to see Jack leaning in the door, panting with exertion through that enormous grin of his as he steps through the doorway and kicks it shut behind himself.

 

“Caught you.” The big man moves faster than Ianto was prepared for, covering the space between them in two large strides until Jack’s squeezed out every inch of space between them, reaching out to casually cup the back of Ianto’s skull, carding through the hair there before sliding down and squeezing the nape of his neck. Jack’s laughing, one of those smug and satisfied laughs he does so well and Ianto doesn’t have it in him to complain. Not when the arm around his waist and the grip on the back of his neck are the only things holding him upright. Distantly he knows he’s making that whining little whimper that he normally thinks is kind of humiliating except for today when his bones have turned to jelly, every bit of blood not currently being used to make him blush has drained to his cock, and running from the man pressing him backwards towards the bed has left him so wet he can feel his trousers trying to stick to his skin.

 

This is the part where Ianto historically begins freaking out, and on one occasion, throwing punches but that guy had it coming by the end. The fact that he’s not freaking out about it is what’s got his breath coming short. He hasn’t had a heat like this; shaky, lightheaded, and desperate since he was a teenager and it’s all Jack’s fault. The alpha doesn’t smell like any one Ianto’s ever been with before, and he thinks the smell might actually be driving him crazy because he’s rubbing against the Captain like this is some kind of cheap heat porn.

 

Jack tumbles him backwards onto the unmade bed, grinning as he lets go of that fantastic kneading vice grip under the ends of Ianto’s hair just long enough to grab him by the hips and flip him easier than Ianto has been moved by anyone since he was a teenager. The ticking under his hands smells clean, but old as Ianto finds himself face down, fingertips scratching against the rough fabric and the bed almost isn’t wide enough for Ianto to spread his legs as far as they can go, canting his hips backwards with a growl when Jack isn’t on the bed quick enough.

 

“Bossy.” Jack’s fingers clench down on the nape of his neck again, kneading roughly at the muscles in his neck that feel like they’re connected directly to his cock. Short, neat nails scrabble off Ianto’s hip as his clothes are yanked off, black trousers left tangled around one ankle and shirt shoved up the back high enough to clear his head, leaving his arms carelessly inside. Jack’s breath is hot on the side of Ianto’s face and the boy can’t bite back an aroused whine as the big alpha behind him slides two wide fingers in his slick needy hole, pads of his fingertips working the hypersensitive ring of nerves there. “That’s a pretty noise. Gonna whine for me like that when you’re hanging off my knot?”

 

He wants to make some sort of smart assed comment, or at least something a little closer to ‘go fuck yourself’ than the eager rumbling moan caught behind his teeth, but he can’t. Not when Jack is nipping sharply at his jaw, rolling his hips easily so that the slick head of his cock rubs against the curve of Ianto’s ass. They’ve only done this once before, Jack sprawled wide in his chair and Ianto bent over Jack’s desk with his teeth locked around his own fist to keep himself from doing something whorish and mortifying like begging to get tied on and Ianto knows nothing’s going to stop him from begging today because nothing’s felt like this before. He tells himself it’s because he’s never been fucked by an alpha who was in rut the same time he was in heat and lets it go. Refuses to think about anything more important than the three fingers working him fast and hard towards coming. Jack’s teeth sink into the curve of Ianto’s bicep, exactly hard enough to pinch without breaking the skin, tripping him over the edge and it’s so good to be able to buck and thrash without being tied down; to actually be restrained by nothing more than the big hands braced at the base of his skull and pushed partially inside him.

 

“Oh,” Jack’s voice is thick with pleasure as he nuzzles the shell of Ianto’s ear, nipping along the bolt of the omega’s jaw. “There we go, that’s the edge off.” He’s entirely too collected, voice mostly steady and still wearing far too many clothes. 

 

“If that’s the best you’ve got, I can get that at home if I’m willing to stretch a bit.” He’s grinning as Jack hooks his arms around Ianto’s chest, fingers digging into the soft skin under Ianto’s collarbone and dragging him up until they’re plastered together, chest to back.

 

“I promise, you don’t have what I’ve got for you waiting at home.” 

 

Jack isn’t kidding. Typically Ianto favors the smallest thing that will get the job done and the captain is hardly that, pressing startlingly large against the tender slick skin that Ianto thought had been carefully worked open. Behind him Jack growls low in his chest, the vibrations rumbling through Ianto’s back and just that easy he’s boneless in Jack’s grip, breath caught in his throat as the big alpha behind him thrusts once, hard, and slides inside in a long hard glide. It’s good. It’s fucking good, it’s great, it’s awesome, and Ianto Jones has been holding his breath for at least thirty seconds now, long enough to notice. He sucks in a trembling gasp and forces his hands to unclench where one is gripped white knuckle tight behind himself in Jack’s hair, the other digging probably painfully into the meat of Jack’s thigh. He starts to tense, ready for some obnoxious soothing comment and instead Jack barks out a deep satisfied laugh and pulls Ianto down further, rolling his hips so that Ianto can feel where Jack’s knot has already started to swell.

 

“Better than you thought it would be, isn’t it?” It’s so smugly Jack that Ianto grinds back and flexes his hips, milking the length stretching him wide until the man inside him groans.

 

“It’s okay.” He doesn’t bother trying to mask the breathy quiver in his voice. “But you’re gonna have a hell of a time living up to your own hype.”

 

Turns out Jack has no problem living up to his own hype. Jack, in fact, may have actually _down played_ his prowess in bed because three hours later Ianto’s lying boneless on the old yellowed mattress watching Jack yank trousers up over his still half hard length. He’s covered in blossoming bruises at the nape of his neck where Jack makes sure to scruff him tightly before he comes and on his hips where he’s been yanked, dragged, gripped, and flipped. Imprints of Jack’s teeth cover Ianto’s shoulders, all of them dug in deep enough to leave perfect reddish-purple indents along the swell of his bicep and strung along from scapula to scapula. He’s in his first ebb and he’s slumped on the mattress struggling to stay awake long enough to eat, sore from his scalp to the soles of his feet, and still he’s watching the curve of Jack’s arse, flexing his shoulders to feel the tug of bruised skin.

 

“You should put a shirt on at least.”

 

“No need. If I know Suzie she’s already thrown a bunch of crap into a shopping bag, written a snippy note, and then had Tosh run it down. These are just in case Tosh is still there.” Sure enough there’s not one, but two shopping bags filled with bottles of water, beer, and snack sized packages of biscuits set on top of a large pizza with a note stapled to the pizza box. “See, she says right here. _‘Call up for food when needed. If you leave that room in rut I will shoot you with the tranq and dump you in a cell. Remember what happened last time.’_ There, I told you, delivery service.”

 

“So, what happened last time?”

 

“I got shot with a tranquilizer and spent the entire time in the cells.” He says it like it’s the obvious answer and Ianto rolls his eyes, grunting in annoyance when Jack drops down to the mattress close enough that Ianto slides against him. He pops the tops off two beers first and Ianto’s so glad not to be plied with water and fruit and small good for him snacks that he forgives being jostled out of his comfortable sprawl and props himself up on his elbow to sip at the long neck his boss presses to his lips before taking a bite out of the perfectly greasy slice folded neatly in half and held up just in reach. They make it through two slices a piece fast enough that they don’t have time to talk and it’s exactly what Ianto was craving, salty, greasy, and hot.

 

“Getting hand fed pizza and beer? I’m surprised every Omega in the Cardiff area doesn’t have your rut marked into their calendar.”

 

“You know me, not real big for people I don’t know following me around.” He grins to take the sting from his words and Ianto bites the thin skin over Jack’s knuckles sharply because sometimes he still has nightmares about what would have happened to Lisa if Jack had given in to that first urge to Retcon him. “Ow! Keep it up and you can feed yourself.”

 

“I can feed myself anyway.” He goes to sit up and snarls in annoyance as Jack drops the slice back into the box and sets the beer down roughly on the cement floor, reaching out and tumbling Ianto flat onto his back with a shove. He slides into the vee of Ianto’s thighs, nipping at his chin.

 

“You can, but I’m enjoying doing it. And all I ask in return is that you don’t bite me.” His skin it tight and prickly where it’s pressed to Jack’s the first flushes of his second cycle rushing back fast and hard and Jack snorts, even as his blue eyes darken, pupils blowing wide. “That was quick. I should have fed us faster.”

 

“You really should have. That pizza will be terrible cold.”

 

“I’ll make Suzie bring down the microwave from the on duty room.”

 

It’s seventeen hours before the last cycle of Ianto’s heat burns out. Jack kisses him long and hard as soon as he can sit up, running his eyes possessively over every bitten marked inch of Ianto’s skin and he’s every inch the typical satisfied alpha that Ianto isn’t sure why it’s not bothering him more.

 

“I’ve got things that I have to do, medical leave or not. I’ll be back soon, two, three hours at most if you want to stay here for a while.” Jack’s fingers stroke across the slope of Ianto’s stomach, gliding up and down the line of his flank and Ianto’s so grateful to not have to come up with an excuse to stick around the Hub without being around Jack.

 

“I could do that, if you were coming back, I mean.” He stretches until the muscles in his calf start to cramp. “If I’m not here I’m in the stacks trying to catch up on the work I’m going to miss over the next few days.” Because Owen is going to make him stay in the Hub now that he knows this is Ianto’s first Heat in months just in case he goes into a second, false, cycle.

 

Jack admonishes him not the push it and isn’t more than three minutes out the door before Ianto’s down the back service corridors on his way to Lisa’s room. The smell catches him off guard. Bitter, metallic, and sickly-sweet like sickness and it’s rolling off Lisa in waves as she threatens to damage herself or the unit writhing slowing in place with sweat streaming down her face. He tries not to gag on the polluted reek of Lisa’s scent and knows he’s going to have to shower thoroughly to get the stink of this rotted rut off his skin before Jack gets anywhere near him unless he wants this all to end badly. She looks at him and he flinches back from the cold flat stare she’s giving him.

 

“Where were you Ianto?”

 

“I’ve been here all day.” His hands are shaking and he doesn’t want to turn his back on the way she’s staring at him. He keeps sedatives on the tray next to the painkillers and Ianto picks up the largest safe dose he has, sliding around to the side of the bed and flinching back as she goes to reach for him and draws up short from the restraints. Her skin is not cold, but it’s never quite alpha hot anymore when he touches her and she gives him the same flat cold stare the entire time he’s injecting her.

 

He doesn’t think the word robotic.

 

She drifts off to sleep slowly, stare losing it’s focus between lengthening blinks and between one long blink and the next suddenly his Lisa is looking at him again.

 

“I didn’t mean for you to do this for me.”

 

“I know. But I did say if I ever knotted it would be for you, didn’t I?”

 

“You did.” She gives him a sickly grin. “So, is he good?”

 

“Really, Lis?” Her chuckle is pained, but genuine as she squeezes his hand tiredly.

 

“I’ve never been with an alpha male. I always wondered.” He flushes red and she presses her palm to his.

 

“Well I’ll tell you all about it when you’re better.”


End file.
